An artificial reality system, such as a head-mounted display (HMD) or heads-up display (HUD) system, generally includes a near-eye display (e.g., a headset or a pair of glasses) configured to present content to a user via an electronic or optic display within, for example, about 10-20 mm in front of the user's eyes. The near-eye display may display virtual objects or combine images of real objects with virtual objects, as in virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), or mixed reality (MR) applications. For example, in an AR system, a user may view both images of virtual objects (e.g., computer-generated images (CGIs)) and the surrounding environment by, for example, seeing through transparent display glasses or lenses (often referred to as optical see-through) or viewing displayed images of the surrounding environment captured by a camera (often referred to as video see-through).
One example optical see-through AR system may use a waveguide-based optical display, where light of projected images may be coupled into a waveguide (e.g., a substrate), propagate within the waveguide, and be coupled out of the waveguide at different locations. In some implementations, the light may be coupled out of the waveguide using a diffractive optical element, such as a grating. As any other mobile electronic device, it is generally desirable that the efficiency of the waveguide-based optical display be as high as possible.